explaining_errors_in_star_trekfandomcom-20200215-history
The Passenger
' |image= |series= |production=40511-409 |producer(s)= |story=Morgan Gendel |script=Morgan Gendel, Robert Hewitt Wolfe, and Michael Piller |director=Paul Lynch |imdbref=tt0708633 |guests=Caitlin Brown as Ty Kajada, James Lashly as Lt. George Primmin, Christopher Collins as Durg, James Harper as Rao Vantika |previous_production=Dax |next_production=Move Along Home |episode=DS9 S01E08 |airdate=22 February 1993 |previous_release=Dax |next_release=Move Along Home |story_date(s)=Unknown |previous_story=(DS9) Dax (Overall) Birthright Part 1 |next_story=(DS9) Move Along Home (Overall) Birthright Part 2 }} =Summary= En route back to the station in a runabout, Kira and Bashir respond to a distress call from a Kobliad freighter and find Ty Kajada, a security guard, and her prisoner, Rao Vantika. Kajada tells them Vantika started a fire on the ship in an effort to escape. Vantika dies and Bashir and Kira take Kajada back to Deep Space Nine, where she becomes convinced that he is still alive. He has faked his death many times before and Kajada has spent most of her adult life tracking him. Bashir and Dax come to believe that Vantika's consciousness may be hiding in Kajada's brain without her knowledge. Vantika has indeed taken on another body, and he contacts Quark to obtain mercenaries to hijack an upcoming shipment of deuridium — a compound Kobliads desperately need to survive. Later, when Quark meets with the mercenaries, they are interrupted as Kajada falls from the second floor of Quark's bar while eavesdropping on them. In the infirmary, Kajada reveals that the real Vantika pushed her. Dax finds a device under Vantika's fingernails that he used to transfer his consciousness to someone else and tests Kajada for signs of the device's usage. Meanwhile, Quark and the mercenaries meet with the real Vantika, in the body of Bashir. One step ahead of the crew's investigation, Vantika and the mercenaries manage to gain control of the freighter carrying the deuridium. The station traps the freighter in a tractor beam but Vantika threatens to destroy the freighter, along with Bashir's body. One of the mercenaries objects to such a plan, prompting Vantika to shoot him. Dax is able to disrupt Vantika's control of Bashir's body long enough for a confused Bashir to lower the freighter's shields and allow himself to be transported to the Infirmary. Once Vantika's consciousness is removed from Bashir's brain, Kajada destroys Vantika's stored consciousness and rids herself of him once and for all. =Errors and Explanations= Plot Oversights # Why doesn't the crew contact Kobliad to check up on Kajada. Her reputation may have preceded her. # Sisko not asking if Vantika touched Kira or Bashir. He probably expected them to mention it themselves. # Vantika stealing the deuridium after taking over Bashir's body. He needs it to maintain control until he can transfer to a new body. # Kajada destroying the container with Vantika's consciousness without Bashir reacting to the resulting scorch mark. He's still in shock at this point. Changed Premises # Odo stating that Dax has lived ten lifetimes here, but only seven in Move Along Home. He may have miscounted. Equipment Oddities # Kira and Bashir being surprised about the fire still burning. They probably expected the fire to have been extinguished by the time they arrived on board. # The flames going out before they are reached by the extinguishing agent from Kira's fire extinguisher. There may be a suppression field emitted from the nozzle ahead of the extinguishing agent. # Vantika only having a single micro consciousness transfer device. He only needs one – besides, they are probably very expensive! # Sisko having a tractor beam locked onto a freighter which has raised it's shields. The shields are an old type, which are likely working at less than full capacity. Continuity and Production Problems # Dax mispronouncing Vantika's name. There may be more than one pronounciation. Nit Central # D.K. Henderson on Sunday, November 15, 1998 - 10:00 am: When I got a video of this episode, I watched it carefully to see if I could spot a nit mentioned in the DS9 magazine, and I did! I did not see it when I watched the first televising. In Quark's bar, late at night, he is suddenly grabbed from behind. You are not supposed to see who it is, but for a brief moment, Julian Bashir is clearly visible. Mei on Friday, January 15, 1999 - 9:36 pm: I don't think that's really a nit. Sloppy editing, maybe, but not a nit. Actually, I think it's pretty good - if you're really watching, you see it. I figured that one out pretty quickly, actually. Who was the only one to actually touch the guy before he died? I thought they were pretty stupid not to have noticed that. Q on Monday, December 20, 1999 - 7:41 pm: During the heat of the moment, Kira and the other person probably forgot about the criminal grabbing Bashir's neck. # Keith Alan Morgan (Kmorgan) on Sunday, September 10, 2000 - 1:29 am: Kajada keeps insisting that Vantika is alive, but never bothers explaining to Bashir why she thinks this and Bashir never bothers to ask. Jean Stone on Thursday, February 21, 2008 - 10:39 pm: She does mention that he's faked his death numerous times before and later she talks about his research into longevity by various means (which gets Dax started on her research). # Kajada says that Vantika did the same purge to the computers on Rigel VII, which is amazing since Rigel VII is where Captain Pike fought the barbaric looking giant in The Cage/The Menagerie. So in just over a century that apparently barbaric world developed computers. Hmmmm… They may have been more advanced than they appeared when Captain Pike visited. # So did Kajada slip or was she pushed? Considering how she was hanging onto the railing, the pushed scenario would seem to be more probable, but I don't remember them ever answering that question. Jean Stone on Thursday, February 21, 2008 - 10:39 pm: Since there was no need for her to hang far enough off the railing to risk slipping, I'd say Vantika/Bashir pushed her (unless you believe in the Law of Railing Kills, in which case it could have been fate...) and we're supposed to assume this. ' # ''constanze on Saturday, October 02, 2004 - 2:09 am: Why is Vinteka still interested in the shipment once he is inside Bashir's body? He no longer needs the stuff to keeps his body from falling apart, since Bashirs body is quite young and healty. And since he knows the technique, he can always pass onto another human when this body fails. Or was he planning on leaving Bashir's brain soon, transferring to another person? Why? Does he have a person with an empty mind somewhere? :O ''D.K. Henderson on Thursday, March 10, 2005 - 5:37 am:'' Regarding Vantika's interest in the shipment even after he's comfortably ensconced in a healthy body--Vantika's primary concern may have been his own health and longevity, but wealth is a great way to maintain that. That microscopic generator, for example, probably cost a pretty penny, not to mention all those computer programs. That shipment was extremely valuable to his own people, and would bring him a fortune on the black market.' # The little thing that contains Vantekas "patterns" sits atop a console when Kajada fires at it. She's a very good shot that she doesn't damage the console at all. Wouldn't it have been better to put the thing on the floor and then fire? 'inblackestnight on Tuesday, March 13, 2007 - 12:12 pm: The console was damaged, if you consider a scorch mark as damage.' # So why does an electrical impulse transmitted through the shields turn up inside the consoles on the Rio Grande? (And how fortunate that Bashir-Vantika was touching the consoles at that precise moment, so the current could hit him!) Wouldn't a spaceship be like a faradays cage? (Just what are the engineers thinking when they are building these things?) 'inblackestnight on Tuesday, March 13, 2007 - 12:12 pm: Bashir et al were not on the Rio Grande anymore, they transported to the freighter. Seniram Maybe the freighter was less resistant to electrical impulses.' # ''Cybermortis on Monday, May 05, 2008 - 1:35 pm: Wouldn't Kajada destroying the affected glial cells constitute murder? Even if Vantika was due to face the death penalty his fate should have been decided by a court, not a police officer? Even if such things are allowed where Kajada comes from she, would have no authority to do the same thing in Bajorian space. Vantika may have been sentenced to death in absentia. =Notes= =Sources= Category:Episodes Category:Deep Space Nine